3 incumbents run in school board race
Three people are running for election Tuesday to three seats on the Jacksonville/North Pulaski School Board.
Each is running unopposed for the seats they already hold.
Daniel Gray, the school board's president, is running for re-election to the at-large Position 1 seat.
Ava Coleman is running for the Zone 2 seat, a position she was appointed to fill last year by her fellow board members after the resignation of Carol Miles.
Dena Toney is running for re-election to the Zone 5 seat on the board for the 4,000-student district.
Each of the terms is for four years and is unpaid.
The Jacksonville district is the only one in Pulaski County that is holding a school board election in conjunction with the May primary. The Pulaski County Special and North Little Rock school boards will hold their elections in conjunction with the November general election. The Little Rock School District is operating under state control without an elected school board.
Act 910 of 2017 gave school boards the choice of holding board elections in either May or November, eliminating the previous stand-alone school board elections in September.
The Arkansas School Boards Association has reported that 202 districts of the state's 235 districts chose to hold May elections.
Nonprofit executive wins honor from FBI
Maria G. Touchstone, executive director of the Seis Puentes nonprofit organization that offers assistance to the Hispanic residents in central Arkansas, recently traveled to FBI headquarters in Washington, D.C., to receive a FBI Director's Community Leadership Award.
Touchstone, who is also the North Little Rock School District's coordinator of programs for all students who are not native English language speakers, was one of 57 to receive the award for extraordinary service to their communities.
The award recipients were nominated for the honor in 2017 by the FBI's 56 field offices and the Criminal Justice Information Services Division.
Touchstone, who received her award from FBI Director Christopher Wray, was praised for her close work with local law enforcement and social service agencies to ensure that everyone in the community has access to the information and services they need.
Ex-principal's name attached to library
The Little Rock School District last week dedicated the media center/library at Horace Mann Magnet Middle School for the late Marian G. Lacey, a former 10-year principal at the school.
During her tenure as Mann's principal, Lacey was named a 1997 Milken National Educator, making her a recipient of a $25,000 cash award and other related honors.
Lacey, who had a doctorate degree, went on to become an associate superintendent in the Little Rock district.
The district's annual award honoring its top teacher is named in Lacey's honor -- the Marian G. Lacey Educator Award.
She was a 40-year educator before she died in 2017.
Metro on 05/20/2018